Good morning, and thank you for inviting me to present and represent Feed Nova Scotia here this morning.
Feed Nova Scotia is a central collection and distribution agency supplying over 150 food banks and meal programs in the province. While our immediate goal is to feed hungry people, our ultimate goal is to alleviate chronic hunger and eliminate poverty. My presentation this morning is based on keeping those two goals in mind.
In Nova Scotia, some households are making difficult choices every day about putting food on their tables for their children. This is happening when the federal government has been posting multi-year budget surpluses. It is my hope that at the end of my statement you will be convinced that, as elected representatives in Parliament, more can be done to help citizens living in low-income situations.
Using statistics from our 2007 hunger count survey, I can inform you that at least 18,417 Nova Scotians visited a food bank for support in March 2007; 9.4% of them reported that employment was their main source of income, which is up 2.2% from last year.
Visiting a food bank once a month used to be sufficient for most households that were in trouble. This year we've noticed a 4.8% increase in the number of households that used a food bank more than once in the same month. These are hard-working people who go to work every day, have children in school, and pay their taxes. You wouldn't suspect they seek help from their local food bank.
These people are typically referred to as the working poor. I am concerned that working people are finding themselves in a financial situation whereby they need to use food banks.
Until an integrated approach to reducing poverty can be implemented in the long term, I am proposing two things for the committee to consider in the short term. If time allowed, I probably could propose many more.
I would ask the committee to first consider changing the working income tax benefit to improve the quality of life for the working poor; 9.4% of our clients access this program. Many are part-time workers who want to work full-time hours, but these are just not available to them. Their ability to take a second or even a third job is limited by the variable hours created by their first job and whether they have access to affordable day care.
This tax benefit was created to help the working poor, and as you know, if a person earns more than $3,000 a year, they can qualify for amounts ranging from $500 to a maximum of $1,000 a year.
Research done in 2005 concerning the cost of food in Nova Scotia found an average family of four paid $617 a month to purchase nutritious food. This is in addition to other necessities such as housing, heat, a telephone, and transportation, some of which have increased substantially in price over the past 10 years, as we indicated in our August 2007 brief to the committee. These costs have had a huge impact on the ability of families to provide for other necessities and to allow their children to enjoy the activities all children should be able to enjoy.
If this program is intended to improve the quality of life for the working poor, it would appear that benefit amounts are too low relative to the cost of living. I urge you to consider raising these amounts.
One of my staff recently shared a story with me that I would like to share with you. She was talking with a woman who was trying to make a fresh start after leaving an abusive relationship. She was moving from a temporary shelter into a new apartment early this past summer. She found a job, but the pay was low. From her first month, she fell further and further behind in her bills. She fell short on her rent for September and October and was given a conditional eviction notice. If she doesn't pay her rent in full by January 1 this coming year, she will be evicted.
This person is frightened, and she turned to us for support. All her money goes toward bills, and then she has to rely on food banks and goodwill to feed her children. Even if she doesn't buy any food and pays all her bills for January of 2008, she will still be $250 short. Between working and raising her children, she has no time for a second job and cannot afford any more day care. This lady told us that if she had a little more money every month, it would go a long way to help her to provide for her children. But she does not know how to get that extra money.
We hear stories similar to this one every day. It seems to indicate that even a small increase, perhaps even $100 a month, in the benefit rate would improve a family's everyday living situation. This seems an affordable and reasonable way to improve the lives of the working poor given that the economic update of October 2007 announced $60 billion in future tax cuts.
The next item I would like to briefly---